The Trecento was a time of active creativity in Italy during the arts, such as painting, architecture, literature, and music. Music during the Trecento shared similarities with achievements in other arts, such as creating new ways of expressing ideas, especially in secular songs written in the Italian language. In some ways, the music of the Trecento might look like it belongs to the Renaissance period. However, the main style of music was more similar to that of the late Middle Ages. Experts usually consider the Trecento to mark the end of the medieval era. The word "Trecento" means "three hundred" in Italian and is used to describe the 1300s. The most significant musical developments in the Trecento occurred toward the end of the century, and the period is often extended to include music from around the year 1420.
History
Little Italian music from the 13th century has survived, so the origins of Trecento music must be guessed. Troubadour music, which came to northern Italy in the early 13th century after troubadours fled their homes in Provence during the Albigensian Crusade, strongly influenced Trecento music. Many Trecento musical forms are similar to those of troubadours from over a century earlier. Another influence was the conductus, a type of sacred music with the same text sung in all parts. Trecento secular music shares some similarities with the conductus, though differences are also clear. Some scholars, like Hoppin, argue that the conductus' influence has been overestimated.
Some of Dante Alighieri’s poetry was set to music during his lifetime, but none of the music remains today. One musician who set Dante’s poetry was his friend Casella, who is mentioned in Purgatorio’s second canto. Other poets of Dante, such as canzoni and ballate, were set to music. If these ballate were like earlier ones, they would have been monophonic (sung by a single voice).
Marchetto da Padova’s music theory, written in the early period, influenced later generations through his treatise, the Pomerium. He described a system for dividing the breve (a musical note) into smaller parts, using dots to mark breaks. Though most Trecento music used the international notation system developed by Franco of Cologne and Philippe de Vitry, Marchetto’s system was closely linked to Italian Trecento music and is often called “Italian Notation.”
The earliest surviving polyphonic (multiple voices) secular music from the Trecento is found in the Rossi Codex, which includes works by the first generation of Italian composers. Many works are anonymous, but some are attributed to Maestro Piero and Giovanni da Cascia. Other composers of this generation include Vincenzo da Rimini and Jacopo da Bologna, who may belong to a later group. These composers were connected to aristocratic courts in northern Italy, especially Milan and Verona. Some obscure names, like Bartolo da Firenze (active 1330–1360), are mentioned in later sources. Bartolo may have written the first Italian polyphonic mass movement in Trecento style, a setting of the Credo.
The two most common forms of early Trecento secular music were the two-voice madrigal and the monophonic ballata. Some three-voice madrigals exist, but the rarer caccia (a canonic form with onomatopoeic sounds and hunting or feasting themes) was more closely linked to three-voice writing. Much of the music was for two voices, though Jacopo da Bologna wrote a few three-voice madrigals and one surviving motet.
By mid-century, the center of secular music shifted south to Florence, the cultural heart of the early Renaissance. The next generation of composers, mostly Florentine, favored the ballata, which became a popular polyphonic form. The ballata’s structure, like the French virelai, follows an AbbaA pattern. In The Decameron, Giovanni Boccaccio described how friends in Florence sang ballatas with instruments in 1348, the year of the Black Death. Though Boccaccio did not name composers, many Florentine musicians were active at this time.
Francesco Landini, the most famous Trecento composer, was born around 1325–35 and died in 1397. He is considered part of this generation, though he may have been active earlier. He was close to Petrarch and wrote 141 surviving ballatas and 12 madrigals. His music appears in sources across Italy. Other composers of this group include Gherardello da Firenze, Lorenzo da Firenze, and Donato da Cascia. This generation showed greater independence in vocal parts and more imitation between voices. Landini’s music was known for its lyrical quality and emotional depth, and his works are still recorded today.
The final generation of Trecento composers included Niccolò da Perugia, Bartolino da Padova, Andrea da Firenze, Paolo da Firenze, Matteo da Perugia, and Johannes Ciconia, a non-Italian composer. Though the ballata remained the main form, the madrigal returned, showing interest in earlier styles. Some works used Italian notation, while others had less ornamentation than earlier compositions. Text-painting (music reflecting the meaning of lyrics) appeared in some pieces, such as imitations of bird calls or dramatic effects.
Ciconia, a Netherlander, was one of the first composers to influence European music for the next two centuries. He studied Italian secular styles in Italy and later composed sacred music, linking Italian and Burgundian traditions. He lived in northern Italy, especially Padua, where he died in 1412.
Another late 14th-century composer, Antonio Zachara da Teramo, was active in Rome, Abruzzo, and Teramo. His earlier works survive in the Squarcialupi Codex and reflect Francesco Landini’s style. His later music borrowed from the Ars subtilior style centered in Avignon. Zachara supported antipopes during the papal schism and moved to Bologna around 1408.
Sacred music, especially polyphonic Mass movements and Latin motets, became more important in the late Trecento. Recent discoveries show that sacred music was a significant part of Trecento output. Ciconia and Zachara were key figures in Mass composition, and their music spread to England, Spain, and Poland.
The end of the Schism marked the decline of Florence’s dominance in Italian music, though it remained active in musical life.
Overall musical characteristics of the era
Music from the Trecento period kept some features from the time before it. It also started to show some ideas that would later be used in the Renaissance.
Consonances included unison, fifth, and octave, similar to those in the ars antiqua period. The interval of a third was often considered a dissonance, especially earlier in the period. Parallel motion in unison, fifths, octaves, thirds, and sometimes fourths was used carefully. Composers used passing tones to avoid these parallel intervals. This created short, harsh dissonances, which showed early signs of the counterpoint style later used in the Renaissance.
After 1350, triads became more common in three-part music. This gave the music a tonal quality that sounds familiar to modern listeners. Accidentals appeared more often in Trecento music than in earlier times. Specific accidentals used included F♯, C♯, G♯, B♭, and E♭. One piece by Landini also used an A♭.
The Landini cadence, also called the under-third cadence, is a musical ending where the melody drops from the seventh note to the sixth, then rises to the octave. This cadence is named after Landini because he used it often. It appears in much of the music from that time, especially after Landini's works.
Music sources
Most of the written records of Trecento music come from the late 1300s or early 1400s, which is later than when the music was first created. The oldest major written record of Trecento music is the Rossi Codex, which was created between 1350 and 1370. It includes music from the earlier part of the Trecento period. Other smaller written records have also been found, which help scholars learn more about earlier Trecento music. These include the Mischiati fragments from Reggio Emilia, which contain several unique types of music called cacce. Other early records include sacred music. Two pages from the Oxford Canon. Misc. 112 preserve a motet by Marchetto da Padova. Additional motets are found on a fragment in Venice, San Giorgio Maggiore. A manuscript called Perugia Bib. Univ. Inv. 15755 N.F. was claimed to be from 1349 to 1354, but scholars now believe it is no older than other sources commonly dated to the 1390s. This shows how difficult it can be to accurately date Trecento sources.
Many of the later, larger written records come from the area around Florence. The oldest of these larger records is the Panciatichi Codex, located in Florence. The most complete and beautifully decorated Trecento source is the Squarcialupi Codex, created in the early 1400s. It includes 352 compositions, 145 of which are by Landini, making it one of the largest music collections of that time. Other important sources include the Reina Codex, the London Codex, and the Lucca/Mancini Codex. A palimpsest, San Lorenzo 2211, discovered in the 1980s, has also been studied extensively, though much of it is hard to read.
Before the year 2000, scholars often believed that certain sources, such as the Modena A and Chantilly Codex, as well as the Ivrea 115 manuscript, were Italian copies of lost French sources and not closely connected to Trecento music. However, this view has changed in recent years, and these manuscripts are now often included in discussions about Trecento sources.
Other fragmentary written records from Padua, Cividale del Friuli, and the area around Milan suggest that these regions were also important centers for creating written music during the Trecento period.